UPDATED POT LAW BACKED

Health Secretary Alex Valdez said Monday he thinks New Mexico should repeal
its medical marijuana law and replace it with one modeled on Hawaii's new
program. "It's an ineffective piece of legislation for all intents and
purposes, which should be repealed," Valdez told fellow members of the
newly appointed Governor's Drug Policy Advisory Group. "However, something
should be put in its place to reduce the pain and suffering that many
people in this state are going through," Valdez said.

New Mexico's medical marijuana act was passed in 1978. The state's Lynn
Pierson Act was named for a 26-year-old cancer patient.

New Mexico's law allows marijuana to be used to relieve nausea associated
with chemotherapy and to ease eye pressure from glaucoma, but only in
connection with a research project.

More than 150 people used marijuana under New Mexico's law until 1986, when
lawmakers stopped appropriating the $50,000 needed annually to run the
program.

Valdez said he tried to revive New Mexico's medical marijuana law last
fall. But he said he ran into several obstacles, including a lack of
interest by the academic community in a medical marijuana project.

"UNM said since Marinol is on the market, there's no need for marijuana,"
Valdez said. Marinol, taken in pill form, is a synthetic form of a
marijuana extract.

Vernon Jackman, a 59-year-old Taos electrician with lung cancer, told the
council that Marinol was not nearly as effective as marijuana in reducing
his pain and suffering from chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

Jackman said he was reluctant at first to try marijuana because it is
illegal.

"I didn't want to be against the law, but I was so sick I was ready to try
anything," Jackman said.

He said he was unable to eat or drink for weeks after undergoing
chemotherapy, losing 50 pounds in two months. He also broke out in hives.

"I didn't know I could be so sick," Jackman said.

Jackman said he first tried two marijuana cookies made by friends on June
17.

"The next morning I had an appetite," Jackman said. "I felt I could
possibly get over this for the first time. ... It made a difference
overnight. For the first time, I was hungry. I could eat and not throw up.
For the first time, I had a glimmer of hope."

Jackman said he thinks using marijuana helped put his cancer into
remission, which was diagnosed in the past few weeks.

"It has made a tremendous difference," he said, choking back tears. "If my
friends had not brought me these cookies, I'd be dead."

"You're a victim of what we've been talking about," retired state District
Judge W.C. "Woody" Smith of Albuquerque, who chairs the panel, told
Jackman. "That's one example of the complete insanity we're here to
address."

Department of Public Safety Secretary Nick Bakas, who sits on the council,
said Jackman should not have to worry about breaking the law while fighting
cancer.

"The last thing he should worry about in his cancer state is that a police
officer is going to take him to jail for marijuana," Bakas said in an
interview. "We have a full plate dealing with people who injure other human
beings and prey on other human beings. That's who we (police) need to
concentrate on."

Valdez said New Mexico should consider adopting a medical marijuana law
modeled on Hawaii's, which took effect in June. The Hawaii law permits
people with specific conditions, such as AIDS, cancer patients undergoing
chemotherapy and people with glaucoma and epilepsy, to use marijuana as a
medical treatment.

The Hawaii law allows a qualifying patient to possess an "adequate supply"
of marijuana "provided that an 'adequate supply' shall not exceed three
mature marijuana plants, four immature marijuana plants, and one ounce of
usable marijuana per each mature plant," according to the legislation.

"Allowing people to grow their own medical marijuana will be an issue,"
Valdez told his fellow council members.

Gov. Gary Johnson created the privately funded drug policy advisory group
last month to develop drug policies in New Mexico in line with his national
push to legalize marijuana and to change other drug laws.

The group, which is meeting one day a month through the summer, is charged
with developing so-called "harm reduction" policies in New Mexico for
harder drugs, such as heroin. The policies would include treatment and
prevention programs, needle exchanges, increased education, government-run
clinics to dispense drugs to addicts and methadone prescription programs.